Quotes of the day

posted at 10:50 pm on March 1, 2011 by Allahpundit

“A coalition of progressive Christian leaders has taken out a full-page ad that asks ‘What would Jesus cut?’ in Monday’s edition of Politico, the opening salvo in what the leaders say will be a broader campaign to prevent cuts for the poor and international aid programs amid the budget battle raging in Washington.

“‘They’re talking about cutting bed nets for malaria and leaving every piece of military spending untouched,’ said the Rev. Jim Wallis, who leads the Christian group Sojourners, referring to Republican spending proposals for the rest of this year.

“‘Are we saying that every piece of military equipment is more important than bed nets, children’s health and nutrition for low-income families?’ said Wallis, whose group paid for Monday’s ad. ‘If so they should be ashamed of themselves.’”

***
“There is no doubt we must get our fiscal house in order. It’s not optional. But the fact is that the money spent on U.S. anti-poverty programs makes a great deal more difference to low-income families than it would to reducing the deficit. The amounts add up to a drop in a sea of red budget ink. But for millions of low-income Americans, they mean the difference between running out of food before the end of the month, and eating well enough to do one’s best at school or work…

“When Jesus talked about how God will judge nations, he said God will focus on what we did or did not do for the neediest among us. Taking care of ‘the least of these’ should be among our nation’s top priorities. It should not be among the first of our responsibilities in line for cuts.

“I urge Congress not to attempt to balance the budget at the expense of vulnerable people. It won’t solve the problem, and it’s not what Jesus would do.”

***
“Even though the 533 billion dollar military budget is the elephant in the room and the gushing, bleeding wound of America’s deficit … it has been the sacred cow. But folks are beginning to whisper. I’m not sure about sacred cows making good hamburgers, but I do know that military money could make some good schools. And the Bible I read gives a powerful image of beating ‘swords into plowshares’ — taking things that have brought death and converting them into things that bring life. It seems the world may be poised and ready for that kind of conversion.

“So it’s not a bad moral gauge — What Would Jesus Do? Who Would Jesus Bomb? What Would Jesus Cut? The Jesus who loved the poor, challenged the rich, made friends with enemies, and healed the sick. So let’s ask it – WWJC? And let’s hope the politicians who claim to follow the Christ who carried good news for the poor will ask this little question as the debate goes on.”

***
“What these ‘progressive’ Christian leaders are doing is committing the same error that some on the so-called Religious Right did, which is to pretend that Scripture can be reduced to a governing blueprint. (In this instance, we’re asked to imagine Jesus as a liberal, big-spending director of the Office of Management and Budget.) The temptation of politically active people of faith is to simplistically connect dots, insisting that certain biblical principles self-evidently translate into particular public policies…

“The Christian ethicist Paul Ramsey wrote, ‘Identification of Christian social ethics with specific partisan proposals that clearly are not the only ones that may be characterized as Christian and as morally acceptable comes close to the original New Testament meaning of heresy.’

“That is what Wallis & Company are engaging in. To argue that their form of liberalism has the imprimatur of Jesus — and to argue the necessary corollary, which is that those who want to return spending levels to their pre-stimulus levels are being unfaithful to the commands of their Lord — is arrogant and harmful. It reduces faith to a political weapon. In their partisan zeal, these Christian leaders are discrediting the very faith they insist they are defending.”

***
“Yes, this debt is a mortal threat to our country. It is also a moral threat. It is immoral to bind our children to as leeching and destructive a force as debt. It is immoral to rob our children’s future and make them beholden to China. No society is worthy that treats its children so shabbily.”

Blowback

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Walter E Williams is just a great person all around. He has a great sense of humor and is not afraid to laugh at himself. He was just hilarious in past years when he would talk about how he bought Mrs. Williams gifts or how lucky Mrs. Williams was to have him as a husband. Unfortunately, she passed away a couple of years ago. He hosted for Rush around Christmas time the year it happened and you could tell he was not his old self. The following year though, the spark was back and he appears to have been able to recover and rebuild his life. Guy is sharp as a tack.

These progressive Christians have no idea who it is that they are messing with when they twist what Jesus said for their own purposes. The Democrats create the proverty with their policies and then force the rest of us to support those whom they impoverished while they siphon off millions as the “middle men”.

You know what else is in the Bible? “You don’t eat if you don’t work”…

In case of transplants those are usually the only two options. So does Arizona or Minnesota seem more American to you?

PrezHussein on March 1, 2011 at 11:53 PM

The issue is not whether or not someone gets the care. It’s whether or not the government is involved in providing it. I support actual charity. I support private groups with grants and funds from the private sector.

I do not support government playing any role in this. It only provides politicians the opportunity to demagogue the issue to garner more political clout for themselves and their associates.

“‘They’re talking about cutting bed nets for malaria and leaving every piece of military spending untouched,’ said the Rev. Jim Wallis, who leads the Christian group Sojourners.

Hey Wallis why don’t you and the other “REVERANDS” in your African American Community worry more about the ABORTION HOLOCAUST (that you support) that has KILLED 20 MILLION precious little souls since 1973.

Hey Wallis, did you know that one of your Progressive icons Margaret Sanger said that YOU ARE A WEED!!

“Reverand” Jesse Jackson, “Reverand” Al Sharpton…..in Progressive World Sanger and her ilk called YOU AND YOUR PEOPLE “WEEDS”………How you like that?

No, dipshit, she got 3 transplants on my private insurance and one on Medicare after the government more or less made it impossible for us to use the private insurance on the fourth. Medicare isn’t “welfare,” either, at least not in the specific sense.

We didn’t get Medicare Advantage until after the fourth transplant. She’s on it now. She qualifies because of both total blindness (disability coverage for which paid while sighted and working) and because the government makes it impossible to use private insurance in ESRD cases.

Umm, a) no it doesn’t say that. As a matter of fact what you are quoting is exactly what these people are pushing, having others work so that the money they make can feed those who choose to not work — the ones who choose not to work and live off the work of others are the ones against whom Paul was railing. If they had been “idle rich”, they could have purchased their own sustenance. and b) you are an @$$

PrezHussein. My daughter has severe eczema. This is a serious skin condition that requires expensive prescription cream among other daily treatments. To help with the cost of these I receive assistance from local charity and her Dermatologist supplies lots of samples. This does not require govt. assistance. It is not a question of WHO gets treated it is a question of HOW.

“Progressive” Christians? Yeah right. That’s like being a progressive libertarian. Oxymoronic. Mutually exclusive. These so called evangelical progressive Christians are evangelists for socialism, not Christ. It’s just a new name for liberation theology. Don’t be fooled America or you inside the beltway country club GOP types.

“The most merciful thing that a large family does to one of its infant members is to kill it.”
Margaret Sanger, Women and the New Race
(Eugenics Publ. Co., 1920, 1923)

On blacks, immigrants and indigents:
“…human weeds,’ ‘reckless breeders,’ ‘spawning… human beings who never should have been born.” Margaret Sanger

On the right of married couples to bear children:
Couples should be required to submit applications to have a child, she wrote in her “Plan for Peace.” Birth Control Review, April 1932

On the rights of the handicapped and mentally ill, and racial minorities:
“More children from the fit, less from the unfit — that is the chief aim of birth control.” Birth Control Review, May 1919, p. 12

On the extermination of blacks:
“We do not want word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population,” she said, “if it ever occurs to any of their more rebellious members.” Woman’s Body, Woman’s Right: A Social History of Birth Control in America, by Linda Gordon

Hey Reverend Wallis why don’t you focus on the great altar of Progressivism that they must bow at…..THE ALTAR OF ABORTION ON DEMAND.

I’m sure it’s like a lot of limitations on Medicare — the government sets limits on how doctors may treat non-Medicare patients based on what they term “uniform payment” principles. If there’s a bureaucratic clusterf**k somewhere in the medical care system (e.g. medical coding requirements), you can bet your bottom dollar it starts with a law somewhere.

Congress gave Medicare the authority to cover all ESRD cases in order to relieve the costs of dialysis and transplants. Insurance companies will now automatically balk at primary coverage because of this, and the few that don’t wind up having to fight Medicare to get out of their way. The practical effect is that none of the bills get paid and the doctors and hospitals come after the patients. I ended up eating thousands of dollars in bills after the second kidney transplant as a result, and just gave in on the third and went with Medicare.

Sorry, Ed, that you had to even witness that goober speaking about your wife like he had a right to. I have read her recent column and I cannot fathom the faith and the love that she has regardless of her lack of mere eyesight. She has the gift of love’s sight. Bless her and your love for her.

Thanks. Government knows how to pretty much screw up everything it touches, doesn’t it?

AZfederalist on March 2, 2011 at 12:21 AM

Dunno if you caught Ed’s explanation, but it was far more thorough than mine. My experiences in health care were limited to a couple of abortive (no pun intended) attempts at nursing school. I just know that as goes Medicare, so goes the private insurance industry — usually. There’s not a doctor out there that takes Medicare patients and doesn’t feel the squeeze — for ESRD or just about any other chronic illness.

To argue that their form of liberalism has the imprimatur of Jesus — and to argue the necessary corollary, which is that those who want to return spending levels to their pre-stimulus levels are being unfaithful to the commands of their Lord — is arrogant and harmful. It reduces faith to a political weapon.

Exactly.

It is immoral to bind our children to as leeching and destructive a force as debt. It is immoral to rob our children’s future and make them beholden to China.

Proven here by the flip side of the moral coin. There are no easy answers. In fact, we are dealing with the consequences of past irresponsibility, when we were too busy to pay attention to what the politicians were doing.

Man, I’m lost…Don’t know what ESRD means…Don’t know what RHIP means…Don’t know what I’ll do now that Prez is gone. He was one of 2 or 3 nics that would cause me to engage my keyboard before taking a deep breath…

Man, I’m lost…Don’t know what ESRD means…Don’t know what RHIP means…Don’t know what I’ll do now that Prez is gone. He was one of 2 or 3 nics that would cause me to engage my keyboard before taking a deep breath…

Thanks for retorting Ed. Sorry you had to…

Gohawgs on March 2, 2011 at 12:30 AM

http://www.acronymfinder.com I’ve bookmarked it, it is very handy for the alphabet soup world we live in. Even within one’s professional field, there are always those who try to save a few keystrokes and make up new acronyms.

Wow ALT! my 1st spawn was born in 1995. Ah the good old days, before cell phones, sexting, FB friending. I may have been an obnoxious teen but I have nothing on my spawn. LOL!

hboulware on March 2, 2011 at 12:40 AM
So you have an ‘almost adult’ as well.
Mine turns 17 on…April 1st. Really.
Btw:my late father used refer to me and my brother as ‘senior springoff’ and ‘junior springoff’.

“What these ‘progressive’ Christian leaders are doing is committing the same error that some on the so-called Religious Right did, which is to pretend that Scripture can be reduced to a governing blueprint.